Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1887-06-30
TO THE wORKINGMEN.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer of a late
date presents the following suggestions
which should sink deep into the heart of
every laboring man who is tempted by
promises of great things from little
people:
In respect to new political parties we
suppose that there are many honest
people that go into them sometimes with
the best of motives. 1t occurs to them
that affairs are not going along as they
ought, and that the old parties are not as
good nor as useful as they ought to be,
and this view OF things is very often cor
rect. But it does not always occur to
these honest citizens that TO start a new
party may be very poor way to improve
matters, or that the energy expended in
vain effort to make the new party go,
might not be otherwise applied with more
and better results. 1t is usually discov-
cred when too late, that the new party
is largely in the hands OF demagogues or
visionary men who either make use OF it
for their own selfish purposes, or lack the
ability to direct it towards any useful
purpose whatever.
We are led to these observations by
noting what was done at State conven-
ton of workingmen held in Concord, N.
H., the other day. The representatives
of the workingmen there assembled, tax
ing into consideration all the grievances
of which labor justly complains, and all
that the welfare of workingmen in gen.
eral requires, thought best not to go into
any third party movement. Instead of
that they set forth temperately and clear
ly their views as to what should be done
in the way of legislation, and declared
their purpose to vote for such candidates,
Republican or Democratic, as they be-
lieved to be most nearly in accord with
the purposes the workingmen seek to
attain. These are set forth as follows:
A bill entitled an act to regulate the en-
ployment of women and minors in manufac-
turing establishments,
A bill entitled an act ts provide for the
weekly payment of wages.
A bill entitled IAN act to provide for a
bureau of industial and labor statistics"
bill entitled an act to make election day
q legal holiday.
bill entitled an act to establish the first
Monday in September legal holiday, to be
known as Labor day.
bill entitled an act to regulate the en-
ployment of children in manufacturing and
mechanical establishments.
bill entitled an act to establish State
| board of arbitration and conoiliation.
A bill entitled an act to secure proper VEN
tilation and sanitary conditions in factories
and workshops.
Now most of this legislation that the
workingmen of New Hampshire ask for
is reasonable and all of it is worth -e-
spectful and serious consideration. Most
of the measures asked for have already
been granted in Ohio and by Democratic
legislatures. We do not enter in any
discussion of them specifically at this
time, but merely refer to them to show
how the workingmen of New Hampshire
propose to act politically, and how they
propose to proceed to obtain such legis-
lltion as they think they ought to have.
They propose to act, not independent of
the old parties and in defiance of them,
but through them and by casting their
influence in favor of the men in closest
accord with their views. In this way
they are likely to accomplish something,
whereas by setting up a party of their
own they would obtain nothing for
themselves and would probably aggra-
vate the very evils of which they COM
plain.
1t is worth while for workingrnen who
are asked to go into an independent party
movement to think of these things.